ducklings, turkeys, and geese were the apparent
live stock; and, under a shed close at
hand, I saw stacks of dry wood, carts, and
tanning implements. As there was no man
visible, I went forward to the house, which I
found locked. Taking the liberty of a peep
through a broken pane of glass, patched but
imperfectly with paper, I saw a living-room
that contained what ought to have been
regarded as defunct articles of furniture;
decayed scraps of all sizes and patterns
picked up at sales, perhaps, or in the shops of
the surrounding brokers. I turned then to
the door of the stables which was much
obstructed by the dunghill and forced that
open, to discover only cows thriving in spite
of filth, and a superb bull ready to toss me.

I turned back for such air as the yard
afforded; and, at that moment, the door of one
of the outhouses creaked upon its hinges, and
a little old man—in a blue blouse, with long,
thin, gray hair streaming from beneath a
shabby cap—appeared before me. He began
at once to appraise me with his twinkling
dots of eyes.

"Good day, Monsieur," I said; "can you
accommodate me with a lodging?"

"Is it a room you want?" he replied.
"Stop a minute, I will unharness the horses;
afterwards you shall taste my wine, and we
will talk. Are you a citizen?"

"I am."

"An architect?"

"O, no."

"Independent?"

"Ah, no."

"But I must have a good price for my
room."

"How much, Monsieur?"

"Two hundred francs a-year."

During this dialogue the unharnessed
horses—which, by the way were of a large
Norman breed, and ill-attended because they
were too tall for their little master—went
their way to the stables. The farmer,
concealing the act as well as he could with his
blouse, took the house-door key from its
hiding-place under a stone, opened his door,
and led me down three broken steps into the
low chamber that I had already inspected from
without. He then reached down from an
ancient dresser a black pitcher in the form of
a priest's cap; and, taking another key from
behind the door, said to me, "Wait here for a
minute." I was thus trusted alone among
the furniture. My friend, when he returned
with his pitcher full of wine, rinsed out a
couple of glasses, and certainly did not stint
the thin sour liquor over which he hoped to
strike a lively bargain. After much chaffering,
it was agreed that I should have my room
for one hundred and fifty francs a-year.

My bonhomme, I found had been left a
widower with a small family, consisting of
one son and two daughters, and was then in
possession of, or rather possessed by, a second
wife, who managed him and his affairs. She
was laborious, and she was vigilant, and she
was garrulous. I have seen her shed genuine
tears at an accident that had befallen a strange
traveller, and I have seen her rob her neighbours
without pity. Like many of her class,
she laboured all her life to convert sous into
dollars and dollars into napoleons, for
ultimate conversion into lands or houses, or for
ultimate enjoyment as a treasure laid up in
an earthen pot. To eke out her savings she
would lay hands not unfrequently on the
possessions of her neighbours, thereby not
greatly outraging the feelings of her friend,
her familiar demon, the notary, with whom
she held very frequent converse, and who was
her father confessor and adviser in all worldly
things.

"One day," she herself told me, "I was
making hay in the field and spied two aprons
on the other side of the ditch belonging to
my neighbours. I crossed over and took
them from the washing line, tied up my load
of hay in them, and was travelling home with
my head lost beneath the hay like a donkey at
harvest, when suddenly I was tripped up and
sent flying into the ditch. As soon as I could
see anything, there were my two harridans
upon the bank, not only taking their aprons
but dividing my hay between them. I was
up with a bound, though, brandishing my
sickle, drew blood from one of them and
bruised the other; they went off with their
aprons, but I re-conquered my hay."

This was the dame who put the rennet into
the milk, skimmed the cream, made the
cheese, churned the butter, counted the eggs,
and slept like a watchdog after a last peep at
her savings. When she went to market, she
was absent for four hours; half the time being
spent in going and returning. Her husband,
on such occasions, went out in the morning
and came back reeling at night. She was a
wise woman; and, being usually loquacious,
startled him at such times by saying nothing
on the subject. Nothing on earth is so
emphatic as a woman's silence, if she would but
know it. Madame at the farm did know it;
and, by shrewd diplomacy, became the mistress
of the whole establishment and keeper of its
cash. Monsieur would have been left wholly
without pocket-money for the tavern, if he
had not been cunning enough to keep back,
out of the produce of his bargains, certain
small pieces of silver which he hid in an old
stocking under a wine barrel behind the
plaster on a beam in the wall. Sometimes this
stocking fell into the old lady's hands;
whereupon Monsieur looked like a culprit,
and there was great scolding, and promising
never to do that sort of thing again.
There was a rumour that the old gentleman
had been a gallant when he was young.
This rumour—which he took as a set-off
against his avarice—he never contradicted.
Like his second wife, he was at heart a miser.
It cost him many a sigh to get any assistance
on his farm. For a long time he dispensed